Senate Budget Chairman Pete Domenici, R-N.M., Senate Appropriations Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, and Senate Banking Chairman Phil Gramm, R-Texas, worked out a compromise Thursday evening on contentious budget enforcement language, effectively clearing the way for Senate passage Friday of the $1.82 trillion fiscal 2001 budget resolution with the backing of the entire Republican Conference.
Perhaps more significantly, the deal, because it includes a $4 billion increase in fiscal 2001 defense spending, could pave the way for House and Senate leaders to appropriate emergency supplemental fiscal 2000 funds for peace-keeping in Kosovo, drug interdiction in Colombia and relief for victims of Hurricane Floyd.
The House last month passed a $13 billion fiscal 2000 supplemental after securing the votes of defense hawks by adding $4 billion in emergency defense money on top of the money for Kosovo and Colombia.
Their support also was crucial to House passage of the budget resolution: while House defense hawks thought $307 billion in fiscal 2001 for defense was too low, they backed the budget resolution in exchange for the $4 billion tacked on to the fiscal 2000 supplemental.
If the House accepts the Senate's extra $4 billion in fiscal 2001 for defense in conference, it could allow the House to drop the additional $4 billion in fiscal 2000 money it added to the supplemental-answering Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott's (R-Miss.) chief objection in rejecting the House supplemental as too "bloated."
Lott acknowledged Thursday evening "That's part of the thinking...it has gone a long way to" breaking the impasse on the supplemental.
House Speaker Denny Hastert, R-Ill., said Thursday that the House would adopt Lott's preferred approach of cutting the package and appropriating the money in the regular fiscal 2001 process.
The Domenici-Gramm-Stevens deal sealed Thursday concerned provisions Gramm had insisted be inserted into the budget resolution to ensure fiscal restraint in the appropriations process.
The provisions called for reinstating the firewall between defense and non-defense spending; limiting advanced fiscal 2002 appropriations to $14 billion, enforceable by a 60-vote point of order; cutting $4.2 billion from the fiscal 2000 non-defense discretionary baseline; a 60-vote point of order against emergency designations on defense appropriations to parallel an existing one against emergency designations on non-defense appropriations; and a 60-vote point of order against using delayed obligations to meet statutory outlay limits.
But on the floor, Stevens offered amendments to strike those provisions to protect his committee's prerogatives and legislative flexibility. Gramm acknowledged that Stevens had the votes to get his amendments through, but said if that happened, he would try to defeat the budget plan.
The final agreement did the following: increased fiscal 2001 defense spending by $4 billion, from $307 billion to $311 billion and retained the firewall between defense and non-defense appropriations; struck the 60-vote point of order against designated defense spending an emergency; increased the limit on advanced appropriations to the House-passed level of $23 billion, enforceable by a 60-vote point of order; and retained the prohibition on delayed obligations.
The increase in defense spending was part of a separate amendment proposed by Senate Armed Services Chairman Warner and Stevens, who also chairs the Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee as well as the full panel.
In addition, Stevens and Domenici agreed to do everything they can to stick to the non-defense spending levels set in the budget-$289.7 billion in budget authority and $327.5 billion in outlays-throughout the fiscal 2001 appropriations process.
Gramm said of the deal, "I take the word of the senior senator from Alaska to be more powerful and worth more than points of order...I believe that is the strongest enforcement mechanism we could have."
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